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This paper examines the impact of nation-wide lockdown on the urban labour market in India and tries to explore as to why the outcomes varied inter-spatially. The fall in the work participation rate and the rise in the unemployment rate show wide variations across states. A number of factors influenced the interspatial difference in difference in the participation and unemployment rates between the pre-lockdown and the lockdown quarters. While both poor and non-poor have been affected by the rise in unemployment subsequent to the lockdown, aggravation of poverty seems to have taken place. States with both relatively higher and lower incidence of poverty seem to have witnessed a rise in poverty due to an increase in the unemployment rate. Further. women in particular, suffered more even in the regions which are highly urbanised and growth-centric. Regions which are relatively more industrialised drew more migrants from the rural areas: hence, the lockdown must have added to their misery. causing interspatial variations in the fall in the participation and the rise in the unemployment rates. The underemployment. especially among the self-employed workers. shot up abnormally. The casual labour and the self-employed workers faced the brunt though some of the temporary workers in the category of regular wage employment could not have escaped the loss of livelihood. Finally, the paper offers certain policy insights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper attempts to investigate the advancement of digital payment technology and how it practically makes any impact on day-to-day small-scale businesses. The study is based on small merchandiser perspective and their experiences regarding digital payment systems. This is research conducted in a small district named Bankura, West Bengal, India, among the small merchandisers to find their opinion about Digital Payment Pathway. A small-scale follow-up survey was made via verbal interaction. Both qualitative and quantitative research has been made among the small shop owners in rural areas of Bankura, West Bengal, India to investigate the impact of advancement of Digital Payment Technologies into their businesses. Throughout the research it was discovered that though the merchandiser were very much aware of the payment pathways, they are very reluctant to make full use of it. There is a significant amount of knowledge gap between the digital payment service provider and the small-scale merchandisers. There are also some practical barriers in implementing the methods in their day-to-day businesses. Considering the findings, the research tries to suggest some alternative ways to encourage the small-scale merchandiser to use more digital Payment transaction in their day-to-day businesses. The research contributes toward hassle free, efficient, easily accessible, and easily accountable financial transactions. It also tries to bring fairness in small scale business transactions and helps government to accounts and monitor day to day small scale transactions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]